Committees and Special Task Forces - Ad hoc Curriculum Task Force (2009)
The Provost's Charge:
I write to inform you of the creation of a faculty task force which will help us implement our strategic plan, the Richmond Promise.
Principle I, Goal 1 of the Richmond Promise is to "capitalize on interdisciplinary and cross-school connections to provide students a distinctive education." There are eight actions steps listed to help accomplish this goal, as follows:
- Redesign the curriculum to make accessible the full range of curricular offerings across the schools, to include a guarantee that all undergraduate students may take at least one upper-division course in two schools outside the school of their major.
- Provide faculty lines to support innovative programs.
- Create new majors, minors, concentrations, and certificates to complement traditional and interdisciplinary majors, and evaluate existing programs to ensure continued viability and strength.
- Provide an innovative shared first-year academic experience for all undergraduates.
- Increase opportunities for shared, interdisciplinary classroom experiences throughout an undergraduates college career.
- Revise the general education and graduation requirements to include attention to our local and international contexts.
- Create greater opportunities for community engagement linked to academic coursework.
- To ensure implementation of these action steps, establish and charge a representative ad hoc faculty task force to propose a revised undergraduate first year experience, general education framework, and upper-division curricular opportunities consistent with an integrated academic enterprise.
The Committee on Committees gave me the names of faculty to serve as members of the ad hoc Curriculum Task Force, and I met with them to give them their charge last week. Although the Task Force as a whole is responsible for fulfilling the charge, their work will be carried out by three committees, as follows:
The Revised Undergraduate First-Year Experience Committee
Erik Craft (RSB, Economics)
Joanna Drell (History)
Joe Essid (Writing Center)
Al Goethals/Thad Williamson (JSLS) (shared committee responsibility due to research leaves)
Libby Gruner (English) (Chair)
April Hill (Biology)
Dan Palazzolo (Political Science)
Carol Wittig (Library)
The General Education Revision Committee
Gene Anderson (Music) (Chair)
Catherine Bagwell (Psychology)
Ann Hodges/Shari Motro (Law School) (shared committee responsibility due to research leaves)
Barry Lawson (Computer Science)
Adam Marquardt (RSB, Marketing)
Terry Price (JSLS)
Clark Williams (Law School)
The Upper-Division Curricular Opportunities Committee
Kathrin Bower (Modern Languages & Literature)
Chris Cotropia (Law School)
Margaret Denton (Art)
Crystal Hoyt (JSLS)
Del McWhorter (Philosophy) (Chair)
Porcher Taylor (Continuing Studies)
Steve Thompson (RSB, Management)
The work of the Task Force is to be completed by the end of the fall semester 2009, with interim recommendations from the first-year experience committee as early as the end of the spring 2009 semester and the general education committee in early fall of 2009. I expect there will be many opportunities for you to give your views to these faculty colleagues, and I know you join me in thanking them for taking on this important work.
Sincerely,
Steve Allred
Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs
February 24, 2009
Committee Documents:
The Revised Undergraduate First-Year Experience Committee
Minutes of the April 13, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the April 6, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the March 30, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the March 23, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the March 16, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the March 6, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the February 23, 2009 meeting
The General Education Revision Committee
General Education Revision Committee Progress Report, October 30, 2009
Minutes of the October 20, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the October 6, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the September 22, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the September 8, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the August 25, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the August 13, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the July 9, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the June 9, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the May 26, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the April 30, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the April 20, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the April 6, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the March 23, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the February 23, 2009 meeting
The Upper-Division Curricular Opportunities Committee
Minutes of the November 16, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the November 2, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the October 5, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the July 15, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the August 31, 2009 meeting
Minutes of the September 14, 2009 meeting